Thesis (Ph.D.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Medicine - Department of Pediatrics

Growth retardation in children with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is one of the most important features of these diseases due to nutritional impairment. So that, the nutritional assessment is of great importance for these patients, allowing early identification of nutritional alterations in the anthropometric measurements or in micronutrients levels. This is an Interventional observational study that aimed at assessing the nutritional status in pediatric patients with IBD, with the intention of providing nutritional counseling and supplementation for 6 months, that help in improving malnutrition (underweight, stunting) that caused by caloric, protein and micronutrient deficiencies. The study included 40 pediatric patients known to have Inflammatory Bowel Disease, attending in Gastroenterology clinic, Japanese Abu Alreesh Children Hospital, Cairo University. There age range was from 3 to 12 years. The patients were subjected to complete clinical and laboratory nutritional assessment and according to their nutritional status, they received the proper nutritional care. Underweight and stunting were detected in 37.5% of the study population and low BMI was detected in 17% of patients. Statistically significant lower values of weight and height-for-age Z-scores were detected among Crohn Disease (CD) group than that among Ulcerative Colitis (UC) group. The infantile age group showed high frequencies of underweight and stunting. Micronutrients deficiencies (Iron, Vitamin D) and nutritional markers (Prealbumin) are common among our IBD patients

Issued also as CD